Kissing a Daffodil
“The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

once when I was a child I pulled green blades
of a daffodil still wet with rain. I wanted to see how
it tasted. I placed the green blade
between my lips – slowly pulling using
my tongue to feel the sharp edge and the soft green
and the cold wetness of it.
years later after kendo
we stood in the rain
and you kissed me. Daffodil lips
you had and I drank in their cool
wetness and my tongue probed the sharp
edges of your teeth and the slightly
bitter taste of your lips – cherry blossom
fingers traced my cheek fluttering
falling to land on my left breast
and stay there – light and clinging.
our love was spring before
it became the sound of a distant crow
echoing across the cold dry field
of goodbye.